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Students can use their own backgrounds and experiences to create culturally relevant performances, in the style of other performing groups like El Teatro Campesino.  "The work also resonated with conceptualizations of how drama can be a vehicle for students to imaginatively inhabit the perspectives and experiences of others in order to help craft critical and ethical perspectives."
(Campano, 2007, p. 95-96)

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Our Mission

It is our mission to create a popular art with a 21st century tools that presents a more just and accurate account of human history, while encouraging the young women and men of a new generation to take control of their own destiny through creative discipline, vibrant education, economic independence, and artistic excellence.

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Our Mission It is our mission to create a popular art with a 21st century tools that presents a more just and accurate account of human history, while encouraging the young women and men of a new generation to take control of their own destiny through creative discipline, vibrant education, economic independence, and artistic excellence.

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Teachers can form groups, safe places, for students to share their thoughts, concerns, and emotions, where they can read a variety of texts together, and can respond to one another through response journals and letter-writing.
(Campano, 2007, p. 95)

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We can recognize the global ties of our students through the use of bulletin boards where students can share pictures of their family members and letters that they have received from those family members.  "It was an opportunity to transform family history into a collective inquiry into our shared space, an opportunity to turn the accidents of history in the intentions of community." (Campano, 2007, p. 82)

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"The promise of the classroom may be to provide a respite for children to allow them to gain insight into their experiences, and to allow opportunities for creating meaning out of potentially numbing contingencies." (Campano, 2007, p. 60)

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Create a new document and edit with others at the same time -- from your computer, phone or tablet. Get stuff done with or without an internet connection. Use Docs to edit Word files. Free from Google.

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Summary - Cheryl Kuhlman

Key ideas of book -  Amanda Coan

Synthesis of Discussions - Amanda Coan

Critical questions about the texts - Mae Cousin & Katie Wilson

Applications to curriculum - Katie Wilson

Pedagogical suggestions from the author - Stephanie Wilson

Multi-modal pieces with text connections - Autumn Den Boer, Mae Cousin, & Stephanie Wilson

Quotes from the text - Mae Cousin

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Overall, our discussions centered around two major topics: assessments and teaching. Teachers can feel caught between the pressures to conform and using their own judgments to improve student learning. These pressures may be related to testing or they may due to colleagues feeling that particular strategies are better than others.
Assessments can be changed to better fit the diversity in the classroom so that it is more appropriate for all students. Assessments mandated for teachers are not appropriate for all of our students. Some assessments can deliver the wrong message to students particularly in reading (example: reading fast). How can we assess critical literacy? Maybe adding critical literacy into our assessments could change the nature of the assessment and the focus in classroom curriculum. Multimodal assessments may prove to be valuable. Having a choice in how information is presented allows students to express their learning in a way that is meaningful to them. Teachers can provide rubrics (single-point even) where the "I can" statements are present and the level of mastery is documented. There is power to student reflections, authentic assessments, and discussions. We want to make sure we're giving everyone the opportunity to show the extent of their learning.
Students' experiences and struggles have guided our teaching in the past. It has influenced our lessons, specifically on empathy, mourning, and other emotional aspects in our students' lives. Our view of being "literate" has vastly changed. Rather than being a skill, we now see it as the ability to use literacy to "read the world" or be an "agent of change". Literacy can be used as a means to "unsilence" our students, giving them an outlet to express themselves. Books and Youtube videos can also be used to address issues of diversity. Our life histories affect our teaching. We see things from various perspectives in school based on our own life stories. It is important to acknowledge that our teaching philosophies, teaching habits or patterns, ways we communicate with families, and how we respond to students is affected by our life histories.
We are all educational activists, but we can be better and it starts with having the courage to make a change to do what's best for kids. This can be hard to do, but something that is important.

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Students share their family's stories through poems and other modalities, connecting the past to the present.

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What does this look like in the classrom?

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What does this look like in the classrom?

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Campano shared many ways that teachers can incorporate the cultural backgrounds and experiences of immigrant students in classroom learning experiences.

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"I used to live in the shadows, hiding myself, and my story due to fear...My hope is for you to look at my artwork and see that I have a story to share." ~ Jose Ortiz

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revelation of an undocumented immigrant.jpg

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"Silence is a tactic of survival under conditions of immediate threat." - Campano, 2007, p. 53.

Campano (2007) shares that the image of a student and her mother, silenced, "awakens us to...other necessary silences in a classroom of immigrants, migrants, and refugee children.  It calls into question our ability to ever really know our students." (p. 54)

"One cause of silence is the asymmetrical power dynamics between the school and the community. Can there be genuine and open conversation when children feel vulnerable to authority?" (Campano, 2007, p. 54

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When students see themselves, their language, their culture included and respected in the curriculum through the ways shared here and other methods they realize that they matter, that they can accomplish anything that their way of life can and does have a place in society that their culture matters.

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Incorporating literature from other cultures (specifically those represented in your classroom) into what you use in your classroom both for free reading and assigned curricular use.

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Allowing for multiple ways of expressing one's learning (sometimes called multi model or project based learning)

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Allowing students to write about their personal and family histories both just in free writing and in connection with curriculum work.

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Teaching subjects from the viewpoint of or including facts and history from immigrant student's cultures. For example if you are studying art, look at famous art from the different countries in your classroom.

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One of Campano's main arguments as an educator who advocates for immigrant students is that, instead of stigmatizing the culture and the experiences of our immigrant students we should use both of those things to help them succeed in the classroom

So how do we do this?
We can use the knowledge, experiences and unique aspects of our immigrant students cultures in our curriculum by:

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Taken from Chapter 5, page 59:

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Taken from Chapter 4, page 46:

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Slam Poetry: "Lessons on Being an African Immigrant in America"

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Slam Poetry: "Lessons on Being an African Immigrant in America"

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Free Quency shares her experience through poetry of being an African immigrant and how she feels perceived and treated. Campano writes of the importance of providing students with multiple ways of showing, learning, and expressing their culture through modes of literacy in the classroom.

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National Poetry Slam Finals 2014 - FreeQuency "Lessons on Being an African Immigrant in America"

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Teachers are continually searching for ways to effectively teach students from immigrant and culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.  Pressures to perform to one-size-fits-all teaching can restrict authentic learning experiences in the classroom.  In this text, Immigrant Students and Literacy, Gerald Campano shares views of teaching and learning through his experiences of working with immigrant students in an urban school through composing narratives.  Campano defines classroom literacy as “varied sets of ‘social practices’ that ‘are themselves rooted in conceptions of knowledge, identity, and being.’” (p. 14).  In addition, Campano focuses his work upon the question, “What would happen if I invited children from immigrant and migrant backgrounds to read, write, and speak from their own experiences and the realities of their lives?” (p. 31)  Throughout this text, he shares examples for how student experiences are one of the most important resources in the classroom.  Campano also talks about the struggle he faces as he tries to balance the instructional practices mandated by his district with his own desires and beliefs about literacy curriculum.  Campano states, “Teachers’ roles are caught between pressures to conform to strictures of outside authorities and an expectation that they assert their own uniqueness in the classroom to facilitate student learning” (p. 91)  Campano discusses the limitations of standardized testing for students such as these and discusses, “Until our profession is reoriented to more systematically and comprehensively support and develop the experiential knowledge of both students and teachers, I believe, children...will continue to fall through the cracks.” (p. 41)  Campano demonstrates how educators can incorporate culturally responsive teaching into their classrooms in order to make learning come alive.  Campano was able to effectively show how a literacy curriculum was created from the students’ own culutural resources, narratives, and identities.

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In chapter 7, Campano relates our personal life to our teaching.

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Campano writes, “I do suggest that how we respond to diversity is both informed by and informs what we value as knowledge in the classroom.” (p.9)

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Click on the link below to see the questions asked in this video in written form:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qpUsHdagZ1UgIbp36bHm85n1tAgGhUSd3xUh79XNq8s/edit?usp=sharing

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Click on the link below to see the question asked in this video in written form:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fHJWQjZP7EQPm7tCaOFxPWQ1qjw4Ge_pyEeGeGv0IbU/edit?usp=sharing

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Drawn Together by Minh Le and Dan Santat

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Drawn Together by Minh Le and Dan Santat

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In this beautiful picture book, a young immigrant boy is not able to speak the language of his grandfather.  They learn to communicate with each other through their shared love of art and storytelling.  As they work together, they form a bond.

This would be wonderful book to read to your classes to help them see how stories can bring people together. The artwork itself is also a beautiful example of tying new and traditional together to create a powerful new picture.

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Learn more about the art work of Dan Santat, which honors his own Thai heritage.

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Learn more about the art work of Dan Santat, which honors his own Thai heritage.

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Follow the Twitter handle @reimaginingmigration to stay up to date on issues connected to migration and to gather more sources about immigration that you could use in your own classroom.

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Follow the Twitter handle @reimaginingmigration to stay up to date on issues connected to migration and to gather more sources about immigration that you could use in your own classroom.

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Tweets by reimaginemigrat

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You could have your students use the Moving Stories app to share and to hear stories of migration.

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You could have your students use the Moving Stories app to share and to hear stories of migration.

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"There is a story behind every decision to migrate...stories that is both universal and deeply personal."

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About us

The Moving Stories Project is the creation of Carola and Marcelo Suárez-Orozco, Adam Strom, Jean Rhodes, and Nancy McNamara. Carola, Marcelo and Jean are leading scholars in the fields of immigration and youth mentoring. Adam is the Director of Reimagining Migration. Nancy is a computer engineer and web developer.

We are committed to fostering understanding and bridging the compassion gap across groups.. We know that when large numbers of newcomers arrive, bringing new languages and customs, they are often met with skepticism and distrust. By sharing our common moving stories, we can begin to explore and reflect about our shared histories and experiences The goal of the Moving Stories App is to just that.

App developer: Hubspire

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Moving Stories | Sharing our Moving Stories

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The Moving Stories Project is the creation of Carola and Marcelo Suárez-Orozco, Adam Strom, Jean Rhodes, and Nancy McNamara. Carola, Marcelo and Jean are leading scholars in the fields of immigration and youth mentoring. Adam is the Director of Reimagining Migration. Nancy is a computer engineer and web developer.

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“The telling of immigration stories exposes a rich array of experiences: loss, longing, duality, triumph and contradiction." - Donella (When These Latinos Tell Immigrant Stories, They Push Beyond Fairy Tales, 2016)

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subscribe to Code Switch podcast

It's easy to believe in a definitive American immigration story. So much of this country's mythos is built on that idea. ("Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free ...") It foretells a fairy tale ending where parents have worked hard, sacrificed much, and settled their children into the new country. The family has assimilated, and the life that came before is a distant memory.

But it's more complicated than that. The telling of immigration stories exposes a rich array of experiences: loss, longing, duality, triumph and contradiction.

When Latino colleagues from across NPR shared their families' immigration stories for Hispanic Heritage Month, their essays were full of things achieved and things surrendered; cultures celebrated and cultures lost; decisions made by choice and by coercion. Camille Salas, a librarian, wrote about her grandfather's decision to join the Navy in exchange for U.S. citizenship. Cecily Meza-Martinez, of News Operations, wrote about her family's hardships and achievements, which included a role in building Disneyland. Producer Ana Lucia Murillo wrote about how her father crossed the border from Mexico to the U.S. in the bottom of a van marked "Laundromat."

Every family came to U.S. with an idea in mind of what its experience might be. But what shines through in these stories is the stark difference between expectation and reality.

We'll share some of their immigration stories here with you. Then, if you have one, we'll ask you to tell us yours.

Intern Monica Itxy Quintanilla's story captures some of the longing and some of the triumph:

"I was raised on stories of mango trees, waterfalls and machetes. My dad, who grew up in a small village in Honduras, glamorized his immigration to the U.S. by decorating his tales with magical realism. For the majority of my childhood, I wholeheartedly believed that mi papi flew into Los Angeles hanging onto the wing of an airplane. ...

"My mother's stories were characterized by a similar sense of adventure and freedom. Born and raised in Guadalajara, Mexico, my mom's urban upbringing made for tales filled with street outings, botanas mexicanas and celebrations. She'd decorate her childhood stories with sparkling eyes and adjectives like 'friendly,' 'exciting' and 'communal' - all antonyms to the words she'd use to describe the United States. With my parents' overt admiration for their homeland, I inevitably begged the question, 'Then why did you leave?' "

Nicole Cohen, a producer on the Arts Desk, illustrates her family's competing desires in her story. When Cohen's parents moved to the U.S. from Argentina in 1982, "They never planned to stay," she wrote, and it "wasn't until I was in middle school that my dad stopped talking about moving back."

Cohen didn't see it that way. She was born in the U.S., was "stubbornly against" the idea of moving to Argentina, and sometimes refused to speak Spanish at home. But after years of annual visits to Argentina, her perspective shifted. Now, Cohen speaks Spanish with a strong Argentine accent and says that "the sounds, tastes and smells of Argentina conjure home almost as much as the U.S."

Even when it was difficult, many families worked hard to hold on to some remembrance of home. Rekha Patricio, who leads the marketing and branding team, grew up in Venezuela, but her parents, who are from India, gave her a Hindu name to remind her of her heritage.

When she was 16, she moved to the U.S. with her brother and sister. At first, they didn't know where they fit in. Strangers often wanted to categorize them as just one thing - usually Indian, since that's how they looked. But as Patricio grew older, she realized she didn't have to choose one identity over the other, either for herself or, later, for her children:

"I've never considered myself fully Latina or fully Indian. It has always been a juggling act between two cultures and multiple languages. Moving to the U.S. further complicated my identity, as there were more immigrants here and it was easier to label me as 'Indian' because I physically fit that box. It took a few years to get to a place where I felt comfortable enough straddling both worlds and answering the question 'Do you feel more Indian or more Venezuelan?' "

Even when they've managed to straddle two worlds, some things were still left by the wayside.

Dustin Desoto, a producer with All Things Considered, is a third-generation American with roots in Spain and Mexico. He wrote about the loss of language. When Desoto's parents were growing up, he said, they'd be hit with a switch for speaking Spanish in school. To avoid punishment, they spoke English as much as possible, even at home:

"This unfortunately trickled down to my sister and me," Desoto wrote. He never learned Spanish.

Other families lost connections, friends, status, belongings. Even the pursuit of U.S. citizenship had a price. Robert Garcia, who leads the Newscast division, was born in New York City in 1957, about a year after his parents left Bogotá, Colombia. Garcia's parents moved back home, but his mother, Stella, returned to the U.S. to escape Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar's reign of terror. Eventually, she applied for American citizenship, but things didn't go as intended:

"The process was so long, bureaucratic, and convoluted that it outlasted her and she died in 1999 before she was fully naturalized. Some six months after her passing, Stella received a summons to appear in court for deportation, despite the fact that the [Immigration and Naturalization Service] had been mailed her death certificate. We patiently explained that neither her court appearance nor her deportation would be physically possible, and after [we received] two more increasingly threatening notices of impending deportation, the U.S. government ... finally let her rest in peace. For the record, you don't get the $700 application fee reimbursed."

Sometimes, though, the immigration story gets a little closer to the fairy tales. Which brings us back to Quintanilla. In the end, her story has the longing, the duality, the contradications, all fused to create a new, more complex American dream:

"Now, decades later, they've finally settled into a country they once felt out of place in. My dad no longer wears his beret with a red embroidered star á la Che Guevara and my mother has grown to love su casita. But their strong value of education and preservation of their culture remains intact and present in both their lives and my own.

"After years of attempting to assimilate into a world I felt both included and excluded from, I've learned to stop categorizing myself into just one label. I am my Mayan ancestors, my great-grandparents, mi mami and mi papi, and myself."

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When These Latinos Tell Immigration Stories, They Push Beyond Fairy Tales

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subscribe to Code Switch podcast It's easy to believe in a definitive American immigration story. So much of this country's mythos is built on that idea. ("Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free ...") It foretells a fairy tale ending where parents have worked hard, sacrificed much, and settled their children into the new country.